"It was still ten versts to the nearest station; but the great,
dark, purple cloud which had collected, God knows whence, without
the smallest breeze, was moving swiftly upon us. The sun, which is
not yet hidden by the clouds, brightly illumines its dark form, and
the gray streaks which extend from it to the very horizon. From time
to time, the lightning flashes in the distance; and a faint, dull
roar is audible, which gradually increases in volume, approaches,
and changes into broken peals which embrace the whole heavens.
Vasili stands upon the box, and raises the cover of the britchka.
The coachmen put on their armyaks, and, at every clap of thunder,
remove their hats and cross themselves. The horses prick up their
ears, puff out their nostrils as if smelling the fresh air which is
wafted from the approaching thunder-cloud, and the britchka rolls
faster along the dusty road. I feel oppressed, and am conscious that
the blood courses more rapidly through my veins. But the advance
guard of the clouds already begins to conceal the sun; now it has
peeped forth for the last time, has illumined the terribly dark
portion of the horizon, and vanished. The entire landscape suddenly
undergoes a change, and assumes a gloomy character. The ash woods
quiver; the leaves take on a kind of dull whitish hue, and stand out
against the purple background of cloud, and rustle and flutter; the
crowns of the great birches begin to rock, and tufts of dry grass
fly across the road. The water and white-breasted swallows circle
about the britchka, and fly beneath the horses, as though with the
intention of stopping us; daws with ruffled wings fly sideways to
the wind: the edges of the leather apron, which we have buttoned up,
begin to rise, and admit bursts of moist wind, and flap and beat
against the body of the carriage. The lightning seems to flash in
the britchka itself, dazzles the vision, and for a moment lights up
the gray cloth, the border gimp, and Volodya's figure cowering in a
corner. At the same moment, directly above our heads, a majestic
roar resounds, which seems to rise ever higher and higher, and to
spread ever wider and wider, in a vast spiral, gradually gaining
force, until it passes into a deafening crash, which causes one to
tremble and hold one's breath involuntarily. The wrath of God! how
much poetry there is in this conception of the common people!
"The wheels whirl faster and faster. From the backs of Vasili and
Philip, who is flourishing his reins, I perceive that they are
afraid. The britchka rolls swiftly down the hill, and thunders over
the bridge of planks. I am afraid to move, and momentarily await our
universal destruction.
"Tpru! the trace is broken, and in spite of the unceasing, deafening
claps of thunder, we are forced to halt upon the bridge.
"I lean my head against the side of the britchka, and, catching my
breath with a sinking of the heart, I listen despairingly to the
movements of Philip's fat black fingers, as he slowly ties a knot,
and straightens out the traces, and strikes the side horse with palm
and whip-handle.
"The uneasy feelings of sadness and terror increase within me with
the force of the storm; but when the grand moment of silence
arrives, which generally precedes the thunder-clap, these feelings
had reached such a point, that, if this state of things had lasted a
quarter of an hour, I am convinced that I should have died of
excitement. At the same moment, there appears from beneath the
bridge a human form, clothed in a dirty, ragged shirt, with a
bloated senseless face, a shaven, wagging, totally uncovered head,
crooked, nerveless legs, and a shining red stump in place of a hand,
which he thrusts out directly at the britchka.
"'Ba-a-schka![1] Help-a-cripple-for-Christ's-sake!' says the beggar,
beginning to repeat his petition by rote, in a weak voice, as he
crosses himself at every word, and bows to his very belt.
"I cannot describe the feeling of chill terror which took possession
of my soul at that moment. A shudder ran through my hair, and my
eyes were riveted on the beggar, in a stupor of fright.
"Vasili, who bestows the alms on the journey, is giving Philip
directions how to strengthen the trace; and it is only when all is
ready, and Philip, gathering up the reins, climbs upon the box, that
he begins to draw something from his side pocket. But we have no
sooner started than a dazzling flash of lightning, which fills the
whole ravine for a moment with its fiery glare, brings the horses to
a stand, and is accompanied, without the slightest interval, by such
a deafening clap of thunder that it seems as though the whole vault
of heaven were falling in ruins upon us. The wind increases; the
manes and tails of the horses, Vasili's cloak, and the edges of the
apron, take one direction, and flutter wildly in the bursts of the
raging gale. A great drop of rain fell heavily upon the leather hood
of the britchka, then a second, a third, a fourth; and all at once
it beat upon us like a drum, and the whole landscape resounded with
the regular murmur of falling rain. I perceive, from the movement of
Vasili's elbow, that he is untying his purse; the beggar, still
crossing himself and bowing, runs close to the wheel, so that it
seems as if he would be crushed. 'Give-for-Christ's-sake!' At last a
copper groschen flies past us, and the wretched creature halts with
surprise in the middle of the road; his smock, wet through and
through, and clinging to his lean limbs, flutters in the gale, and
he disappears from our sight.
"The slanting rain, driving before a strong wind, poured down as
from a bucket; streams trickled from Vasili's frieze back into the
puddle of dirty water which had collected on the apron. The dust,
which at first had been beaten into pellets, was converted into
liquid mud, through which the wheels splashed; the jolts became
fewer, and turbid brooks flowed in the ruts. The lightning-flashes
grew broader and paler; the thunder-claps were no longer so
startling after the uniform sound of the rain.
"Now the rain grows less violent; the thunder-cloud begins to
disperse; light appears in the place where the sun should be, and a
scrap of clear azure is almost visible through the grayish-white
edges of the cloud. A moment more, and a timid ray of sunlight
gleams in the pools along the road, upon the sheets of fine,
perpendicular rain which fall as if through a sieve, and upon the
shining, newly washed verdure of the wayside grass.
"The black thunder-cloud overspreads the opposite portion of the sky
in equally threatening fashion, but I no longer fear it. I
experience an inexpressibly joyous feeling of hope in life; which
has quickly taken the place of my oppressive sensation of fear. My
soul smiles, like Nature, refreshed and enlivened."
[1] Imperfect pronunciation of _batiuschka_, "little father."
24. And for modesty, too, the literatures of England and Russia furnish
instructive comparisons. Russia has no autobiographies of note. Men
there were too busy with their art to have much time left to think of
themselves. Turgenef writes Reminiscences, but only of others, and not
of himself; and when he speaks of his own past, it is only incidentally,
and with the delicacy of a maiden. Tolstoy gives, indeed, an
autobiography as sincere as Rousseau's and as earnest as Mill's, but
only because he believes that an account of the spiritual struggles _he_
went through would be helpful to other strugglers with the terrible
problems of life. But of their _personal_ history there is seldom more
than a trace found. Compare with this the autobiographies of Gibbon,
Leigh Hunt, Mill, or even the Reminiscences of Carlyle, and the
widely-branching outpourings of Ruskin in his autobiographical sketches.
Not that the English over-estimate their own worth and importance, but
the Russians seem to have the instinctive sense of measure in personal
matters.
25. Much of this purity of taste is due to a singular circumstance in
its literary history. Unlike other countries, in Russia, for a long
time, literature has been the favorite solely of the educated and
wealthy classes. Almost all the great names of Russian literature,
Pushkin, Lermontof, Hertzen, Turgenef, Zhukofsky, Griboyedof, Karamzin,
Tolstoy, were aristocrats, if not always by birth, at least by
surroundings. The men of letters sprung from the people, nourished by
the people, living among the people, the Burnses, the Bérangers, the
Heines are unknown in Russia. I have already stated that originality
must not be looked for on Russian soil; that Russian literature is
essentially an imitative literature in its forms, hence imitative force
must have time to look about, examine, copy, and for this leisure,
wealth is necessary.
26. This absence of originality has thus proved a source of blessing to
Russian literature which well-nigh makes up the loss. For literature
thus being in the hands of men of leisure, free from the struggle for
bread, was never governed in Russia by the law of supply and demand, and
the dollar never became, as with us, the potent, even though the
temporary arbiter of its destinies. Hence the singular purity of
Russian literature in point of style. Dickens needs the dollars, and he
therefore spins out his satires to a length of distance to be traversed
only by seven-league boots, and in verbosity is equalled only by
Thackeray. Gogol, however, not only compresses his chapters, but even
burns the whole second part of his masterpiece, "Dead Souls," as
unworthy of his best art. George Eliot, writing for a standard which
requires three volumes for each novel, must fill her story with all
manner of description which does not describe, and reflection which does
not reflect; but Turgenef files and files until he is reproached more
for omitting too much than for adding too much. And America's greatest
living writer (I say greatest, because he is purest in spirit, gentlest
in heart, and freest in mind) can still go on from year to year
producing one novel annually with the regularity of a baker's muffin at
breakfast. Compare with this his own master, Tolstoy, who for months
forsakes his masterpiece, "Anna Karenina," because of a fastidious
taste! Hence the question why Mrs. Astor never invites to her table
literary men, which agitated them recently, could not have even been
asked in Russia. Such a question is only possible in a country where the
first question a publisher puts of a book is not whether it is good, but
whether it is likely to pay.
27. Faithfulness of labor and finish of form are therefore
characteristic of whatever has any reputation in Russia; and as works of
art, there are few works of the Russian masters that are not veritable
masterpieces. I say this with confidence of Turgenef, Tolstoy, Gogol,
and Pushkin; but I think this remark would hold even of the lesser
lights of Russian literature. A sincerity, a truthfulness, a realness,
is thus found in Russian literature, which makes it _be_ a thing of
beauty instead of doing some deeds of beauty. On reading "Uncle Tom's
Cabin," you involuntarily ask, "What effect has this book had on slavery
in America?" On reading Turgenef's Memoirs of a Sportsman, though it
accomplished as much for the serf, you no longer ask, "What has the book
done for the serf?" You do not think of the serf any more now that he
has ceased to be. But you do think of the innumerable things of beauty
that roll out from his pages before you as if from a kaleidoscope. And
if to be is greater than to do, then Russian literature is truly
original, even though its forms be borrowed; since instead of seeming it
_is_, and whatever truly _is_, is original.
28. From this sincerity of Russian writers comes the third great virtue
of Russian literature, a virtue possessed as yet by other literatures in
but a small degree. The Russian writer is first of all in earnest, and
he has no time to give to _mere_ entertainment, mere amusement. The
Goldsmiths with their Bees and their Citizens of the World, the Addisons
with their Spectators, nobly writ though these be, yet written mostly
with no higher purpose than to make the breakfast-roll glide down the
throat more softly,--these exist not in Russia. Things of beauty, things
of entertainment, like Addison's Essays, are indeed found in Russia; but
not for entertainment alone were these writ, hence not in the strain of
mirth. Rather are they writ with the blood of the heart; for to the
Russian, "Life is real, life is earnest," not a mere pastime, and it was
given to a Russian painter to make the all-known but singularly-forgotten
observation that Christ never--laughed!
29. But while the native endowment of the soul, its spiritual capital,
is the chief guide of the fate of literature, other forces also affect
its course, the chief among which is the political government of the
people. In most countries the influence of government upon literature
has been slight. Shakespeare's plays, Milton's Paradise, were not
affected by the political struggles of England. The sole writing of
Milton which was affected by English politics, his prose, belongs to
literature only in so far as it throws light on the author of Paradise
Lost. Dante's Divine Comedy, charged though it be with the political
electricity of his times, was but little affected by the state of
government. In other countries the government of the people was as much
itself an effect of the native endowment of the soul as its literature;
and government and literature flowed therefore side by side, in two
parallel streams, seldom interfering with each other's course. In
Russia, however, government has extended a powerful influence on
literature, and the most marked effect of its influence is the
short-livedness of most Russian authors. The calm, peaceful existence of
the literary man has already been sung by Carlyle as a life-lengthener.
In Russia, however, the same fatality which has pursued its political
rulers has also pursued its spiritual rulers; and as most conquerors
have died an unnatural death, so most writers have died an unnatural
death, or only after an unnatural life. The witticism of Mark Twain,
that the bed must be a most fatal place, since most people die in bed,
is not applicable to Russian emperors and Russian writers. Few of them
can be said to have died in their beds. Griboyedof is assassinated;
Pushkin and Lermontof are murdered; Gogol is found dead from bodily
starvation, and Byelinsky is found dead from spiritual starvation;
Batushkof dies insane; Dostoyefsky and Chernishefsky are in prison the
best years of their lives; Turgenef can find the length of his days only
in exile, and Tolstoy the length of his in ploughing fields. For such a
strange disharmony in the lives of Russian men of letters, the
government is largely responsible. An autocracy which feels itself
called to wrap literature tightly in swaddling-clothes, and establishes
a censorship which does not shrink even from making verbal changes in
the works of the artist to improve his style, can accomplish little more
than the shortening of literary lives. For literature is a flower which
can only wither at the touch of unhallowed hands, and the rude hands of
the censor are far from being hallowed.
30. Hence Russian literature not only _is_ a mere fragment, a mere brick
of the vast edifice which it is capable of becoming; it is even bound to
remain a mere fragment for a long time to come. For as Socrates lived in
Plato, Plato in Aristotle, and Aristotle in the Schoolmen, as Lessing
lived in Goethe, Goethe in Heine, and Heine in young Germany, so great
literary fathers reappear in the progeny of the next generation; the
reproduction is indeed oft puny enough, still the reproduction is
there. But in Russia, while Pushkin lived in Gogol, and Gogol in
Turgenef, the generation which was to inherit the kingdom left by
Turgenef and Tolstoy is now buried in fortresses and dungeons. And as in
America mammon has so eaten away literary aspiration as to leave Emerson
and Hawthorne, Prescott and Motley, intellectually childless, so in
Russia, autocracy has so eaten away the literary material as to leave
the great masters childless.
31. Fortunately, though deprived by despotism of all power of
propagation on Russian soil, the noble spirit of Russian literature has
by a force I cannot but call divine been allowed to be propagated on
foreign soil; and if the literature of the west, which is now stagnating
in the pools of doubt, irreverence, mammon, and cold intellectualism,
misnamed culture, is to be purified, the purification must come from the
breath of Life which blows from Russia. This is the true meaning of the
present craze for Russian authors. There is a force in them which the
mass instinctively recognizes as divine; it feels for it, gropes for
it, and the Devil, as usual, is the first to seize for his purposes
whatever noble impulse comes over men, and this search for the divine of
the mass becomes a sham, a fashionable craze. Hence the rage, the boom.
This is the inevitable stage of falsehood through which every noble
aspiration must pass. By and by the stage of truth must come, and come
it shall, in due time. Russian authors will then be read not because it
is the fashion and the craze, but because they have a message from the
very heavens to deliver unto him that hath eyes to see and ears to hear:
the message of sincerity, the message of earnestness, the message of
love. Then will have been reached the stage of truth.
32. Out of this crampedness of Russian literature by government
developed that virtue of its masters, which with their sincerity and
simplicity, or moderation, forms a most beautiful trinity of graces; I
mean their freedom. You will indeed hear full many a yard-stick critic
as he goes about with his load of pigeon-holed boxes to take measure of
each author, and label him, and duly relegate him to convenient
pigeon-hole,--such critic you will hear discourse much about classicism,
and romanticism, and realism, and of their prevalence at different times
in Russian literature. Believe it not! The Russian author who is at all
worth classifying is slave of no school; he is free, for he is a
worshipper of the truth which alone maketh men free, he is a school unto
himself. Is Gogol a realist? He gives you indeed the reality, but he
breathes into it a beauty only visible to idealizing eyes. Is Turgenef a
realist? When thrilled with the unspeakable beauty of the sky, he
depicts it so as to realize for you the ideal. And when Tolstoy is
thrilled with a moral emotion, he depicts it so as to idealize the real
for you. The Russians thus refuse to be classified. And they belong to
only one class,--the class of those that cannot be classified.
33. Thus has it come to pass that the west, to which Russian literature
owes its nourishment, is now in its old age to be nourished by its
foster child. The child is to become the father of the man; and Russian
literature is henceforth to be the source of the regeneration of the
western spirit. As the future fighters for freedom will have to look to
the Perofskayas, to the Bardines, and the Zassulitshes, and to the
unnamed countless victims of the Siberian snow-fields for models of
heroism, so methinks henceforth writers must look to the Russians for
models in their art: to Gogol for pure humor, to Turgenef for the
worship of natural beauty, to Tolstoy for the worship of moral beauty.